The Pitfalls of Buying Products with Rebate Coupons

If you have never purchased a product that offered a mail-in rebate, you are a rare species. If you have, you most likely have experienced rebate hell. It seems as if you are there for eternity, sending countless emails, getting an auto-reply but no answers, and endless phone calls to the company asking when your rebate will arrive. That is, if you are lucky enough to find a phone number for the company AND can actually connect to a live person. The Mr. Roboto voice menu is guaranteed to drive you nuts and give up. I believe that's exactly what these companies want.

For instance, you buy a computer hardware device at one of the big box stores, or even online, and it offers a fairly significant rebate of $75. Wow! That brings the price of the must-have widget down to $9.95. You jump at the chance to buy this widget and gladly fork over $85 plus tax. You dutifully fill out the rebate form and make a copy of the sales receipt and send it on its merry way. At this point, you have started your journey to rebate hell. Yeah, I know, you read the disclaimer on the coupon that states "please allow 6 to 20 weeks to process". But, you think, "it can't take THAT long to send me my check" and confidently believe you'll get it in a week or two. Besides, you need that $75 because you blew your budget on the widget.

After a month, you start the painful process of trying to find out when you will get your money. You are better off banging your head against the wall, because it feels good when you stop.

I've been lucky so far with rebates, even though they took a couple of months and I forgot what the rebate check was for when I got it! But recently, I was scammed by a Heartland America "rebate". I bought something that out of their catalog that screamed "$20 rebate on this item!". How could I resist? After a month or so, I contacted them via email to inquire about my rebate check. It was then that I was told the "rebate" was actually a credit towards a future purchase from them. The kicker? The "rebate" was only good for thirty days and, of course, it had expired. I told them what they could do with their rebates.

To avoid rebate hassles, arm yourself as a good consumer with information. Here's some good info right now: the two major offenders are Buy-Com and Office Depot. How do I know this? The Rebate Report Card, that's how. Go to www.rebatereportcard.com BEFORE you buy anything, and check the company's rating at this very helpful site.

The Rebate Report Card site is well organized, very easy to navigate and contains tons of useful information. One of the first things you see on the home page is a search box. Put in the company's name and search the reports it has received. The reports are filed by real people like us by entering certain information about our rebate experiences.

The "submit a report" form link takes you to their web form where you enter the company name, product name, product type, rebate amount promised, etc. It then asks you questions about if you got it, how long it took, if you contacted the company, the grade you give the customer service department, the grade you give for their instructions, and a box for your comments. It's very easy to fill out and worth the few minutes. In this regard, we all help each other by reporting the scams and idiocy out their in shopping land.

The site also includes links for:

1. The Worst and Best Companies and Most Recent Reports
2. All Companies (you can see the average grade for each company in the database)
3. Search the Rebate Reports (includes a lot of useful information, such as how long you can expect to get your money based on recent reports of that company)

Some of the reports are only as recent as 2006, but I think it's a function of this being a little known site. When searching the reports page (best and worst companies) there are a lot of recent reports.

To sum up, here's what I would do before buying a product with a rebate:

1. Go to this site first and investigate reports, particularly recent ones since companies do change their habits when there are a lot of complaints.
2. Read ALL the fine print for the rebate. Yeah, that's painful, too, but if you don't you may lose out on the rebate like I did. Understand ALL of the things you have to submit for the rebate. The extra few minutes will save hours and days of aggravation down the rebate road.

Good luck!